Lessons with Lendon: 25 Progressive Dressage Lessons Take You from Basic Whoa and Go to Your First Competition (Popular Training Series from Practical Horseman) [Paperback]

Lendon Gray (Author)

Book Description

Series: Popular Training Series from Practical Horseman | Publication Date: November 1, 2003

A progressive course in basic dressage riding, with 175 step-by-step color photos.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

Trainer and international dressage competitor Lendon Gray helps riders of all sports and levels improve and enjoy daily training with her simple, down–to–earth approach to building riding skills. Lessons begin with the rider’s position and progress through working on contact, putting the horse on the aids, perfecting transitions, and, for some healthy variety, cavaletti and basic trail work. At the end of each lesson, “Lendon’s Challenge” tests the skills learned, and there are exercises to ensure horse and rider continue to work correctly. In preparation for showing, instructions are provided on riding circles, straight lines, and turning onto the centerline. The book concludes with hints on preparing for a dressage show and an after–the–show analysis and action plan for further progress. Lendon Gray is a veteran of the 1980 and 1988 U.S. Olympic Dressage Team and is a highly respected trainer of both horses and riders. She lives in Bedford, New York.

About the Author

Lendon Gray is a veteran of the 1980 and 1988 U.S. Olympic Dressage Team and is a highly respected trainer of both horses and riders. She lives in Bedford, New York.

Product Details

• Paperback: 100 pages
• Publisher: Trafalgar Square Books (November 1, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1929164165
• ISBN-13: 978-1929164165
• Product Dimensions: 10.7 x 8.4 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #354,762 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #25 in Books > Crafts, Hobbies & Home > Animal Care & Pets > Horses > Showing & Training

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

37 of 38 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Lessons with Lendon, October 27, 2004

By 

Brenda Bowle-Evans (Golden, British Columbia) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Lessons with Lendon: 25 Progressive Dressage Lessons Take You from Basic Whoa and Go to Your First Competition (Popular Training Series from Practical Horseman) (Paperback)

This book is a reprint of a series Lendon Grey did for Practical Horseman Magazine some years ago. Excellent book, well done with very clear concepts and goals. The lessons are set up in a very logical order with lots of pointers on how to make the exercises work for you and your horse and what to do if you are not getting the right response. Each chapter ends with a riding challenge. This book is well worth the money, a great resource for student and teacher alike. You will return to it over and over again.

25 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Good book, August 27, 2004

By 

Amy D. Allen "AA Equestrian" (Olympia,WA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Lessons with Lendon: 25 Progressive Dressage Lessons Take You from Basic Whoa and Go to Your First Competition (Popular Training Series from Practical Horseman) (Paperback)

I found this book helpful. It is easy to understand and also has pictures for those who are more visual in their learning process. It covers a lot of the basics, which some need to go back to to help them in the more advanced movements of dressage. Dressage can be very initimidating with the language that is used, but this book explains terminology and concepts. This book also has "Lendons Challenges" which cover the more common errors riders tend to make when doing the different movements. The only fault I found was the majority of horses are wearing flash nosebands. To me this is a fashion of the times and curbs the horses potential.

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Should be a 4.50, but there's no intermediate step on the stars, January 28, 2007

By 

Rotty3M "rotty3m" (Florida, United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Lessons with Lendon: 25 Progressive Dressage Lessons Take You from Basic Whoa and Go to Your First Competition (Popular Training Series from Practical Horseman) (Paperback)

Let me start by saying, I really think this is a good book to have in one's library. Why? In succinct, but not short or even overly brief statements, Lendon Gray provides chunks of information that neither overwhelm nor talk down to the reader.
Having ridden twice in the Olympics, she knows obviously a lot more about dressage than most of us. What makes this book a pleasure is the presentation. She does it on a straight-forward approach as if talking to someone who is on the same level as her. There is a sense of equality between writer and reader's level of knowledge. In other words, she does not come across as a "I know it all and you know nothing."

All the information throughout the 25 lessons are chunked into small pieces, each comes with a succinct heading that gives the reader a clue as to what she will talk about in the next third or so column. What made this book very useful to me are the images of "right / correctly" and "wrong / incorrectly" applied principles. She details what can be done to correct wrong workings in very good depth, which makes this very useful for either between lessons or for those who do not have the opportunity of working with a dressage trainer on a regular basis.

I can recommend this book for most levels of riding, but believe that as with many books, it will be most useful to those who work in Training through lower Level 2 stages. Advanced Level 2 through Grand Prix riders will be far to knowledgeable to get a great deal of use out of this. But for the majority of riders, I think this book is great and it delivers what it set out to do: teach from start of riding to the first competition. It also provides a great place to go back and figure out "what went wrong" to help correct problems that creep up in riding.